


Holding Pattern

by OMOWatcher



Series: Holding Pattern [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Anxiety Attacks, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, Hiding Medical Issues, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, Hydra Are Shitheads, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Medical Conditions, Omorashi, Paruresis, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Hatred, Sickfic, Social Anxiety, Teeny Bit Of Incidental Smut, Well Kind Of..., Wetting, shy bladder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-30
Updated: 2016-11-30
Packaged: 2018-09-03 12:12:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8713498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OMOWatcher/pseuds/OMOWatcher
Summary: This hadn't been a problem before Bucky had fallen from the damn train. But Hydra had their rules, and The Asset had quickly learned to follow them to the letter, however painful that was. Because the punishment was always far, far worse... Unfortunately, not everything was as easy to undo after The Asset returned to life as Bucky Barnes. (Translations of Romanian can be seen by hovering over the text, or clicking on the [↓] after the phrase)





	

**Author's Note:**

> So, just about sneaking in for the end of **No Shame November**! 
> 
> This is actually a combination of two plot bunnies. The first, the main gist of this story, came into being while brainstorming and enabling trash with [WhatEvenAmI](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WhatEvenAmI/pseuds/WhatEvenAmI). It was initially meant to be little more than an excuse for omorashi smut, but along the way, Feels(tm) happened, and now it turned into this, with several more ideas in the works to follow. 
> 
> The second plot bunny I saw on an omorashi Tumblr, whose name I have sadly forgotten now; _"What if someone who is bilingual is desperate to pee, and is ranting about it in their second language, without realising that you can understand every word they are saying?"_
> 
> And so, the concept of Bucky speaking Romanian when he wants to mutter to himself privately is born.
> 
> Lots of people have helped me out with this, so many thanks go to [Lauralot](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lauralot/pseuds/Lauralot), [VoiceOfNurse](http://archiveofourown.org/users/VoiceOfNurse/pseuds/VoiceOfNurse), [LittleSolnyshka](http://archiveofourown.org/users/littlesolnyshka/), [SebastianFloofyHair](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Sebastianfloofyhair) and probably a whole bunch more people that I have forgotten! Without you all reading it through, betaing, helping me work through the kinks (no pun intended) and encouraging me not to trash this halfway through when I lost all confidence in it, it wouldn't be finished now. You all rule!
> 
>  **Warning** \- This does contain mentions of past maltreatment at the hands for Hydra for poor Bucky, and some of them are particularly humiliating. If this is likely to bother you, please be careful when reading this. 
> 
> **Disclaimer:**
> 
> Anything you recognise doesn't belong to me. The characters of Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Clint Barton, Natasha Romanov, Bruce Banner, Thor, Jane Foster, Darcy Lewis, Wanda Maximoff, FRIDAY and the Hydra organisation belong to Marvel. Everything else, including the plot and any original characters belong to my trashy brain.
> 
> No profit is being made from this, nor is any infringement or offence intended. Any relation or similarity to real situations is purely coincidental.
> 
> Please don't sue me. I'm poor.

 

Bucky grabbed the beer bottles in one hand and the shot glasses in the other, and turned away from the bar to head back to to the table where Steve was waiting for him. Even with his sharp reflexes, he almost ended up with whiskey down his shirt more than once as he weaved between the heaving throng of bodies on the dance floor, and he muttered a curse under his breath in Russian as he glared at the back of the person who had just walked in front of him without even bothering to look. By the time that he finally made it back to their table, he smacked the bottles down hard enough to rattle the empty glasses already on the surface, and threw back his shot, promptly nudging Steve’s in front of him.

“You’re goin’ up from now on, Steve,” Bucky grumbled slouching into his chair and wrapping his hand around his beer, dwarfing it. “One more damn mook steps in fronta’ me when I’ve got my hands full an’ I’m gonna kick his ass into next week,”

Steve quirked his eyebrow up, necking the shot and smacking his lips at the burn.

“What’d ya last servant die of, Buck? Because I’m pretty sure it wasn’t old age,” he replied, with a snort of laughter as Bucky glared at him

“Shuddup, punk,” he growled, more for show than anything.

“Jerk,” Steve replied, promptly, his lips twitching.

“Chicken,” Bucky threw back at him. His eyes narrowed as Steve’s smile grew bigger, before the blond responded.

“Fathead,”

Bucky rummaged through his memories, trying to recall more of the names they used to hurl at each other back _Before._ Biting back the smirk that almost automatically came to his lips, he finally snarked back.

“Dope,”

“Geezer,” Steve answered, his eyes twinkling mischievously as he watched his best friend trying to maintain his grouchy exterior. Even though Bucky only had a year on Steve - well, one year, three months and two weeks, if you were being precise about it - he had always taken great pleasure, before the war, in calling Bucky “old man” or even “dad” whenever he tired of Bucky’s protectiveness.

“Knucklehead,” Bucky countered, unable to stop the corner of his lips curling up into a crooked smile

“Meatball,”

“Alright, wiseguy. Give it up, already!” Bucky capitulated, chuckling quietly to himself as he raised his bottle to Steve in a silent toast.

He’d missed this. It hadn’t been an instantaneous thing; in fact, it had taken months of therapy, introspection, night terrors and a trial both by jury and the press, without even considering the months spent back in cryo after the fiasco of the Sokovia Accords. When the medical team, headed by Tony Stark, of all people, had finally woken him with the news that they had worked out a way to nullify the trigger words, one that didn’t involve someone else fucking around inside his brain, it had taken three days for him to actually believe them. As much as he had appreciated Scarlet Witch’s assistance during the battle to reach Siberia, the very idea of her getting inside his head and manipulating his memories had caused him to dissociate into a catatonic stupor, motionless and mute for hours; nobody suggested that option a second time.

Bucky glanced across the dance floor, where Natalia and Wanda were busy dancing outrageously - or what passed for dancing these days - to whatever noise was currently playing over the sound system. Clint had vanished over towards the pool tables that were tucked into one of the back rooms, no doubt hustling the other players. It wouldn’t be the first time Clint had ended up with a split lip or black eye from pushing his luck too far with a regular.

Somehow, Tony had managed to weasel his way out of their little team night out and had already been secluded away in his lab when they left, doing something incomprehensible with his Science!Bro, Bruce; but Thor’s thunderous laughter could be heard across the room where he was sat, with Jane perched on his massive thighs and Darcy gesticulating wildly as she tried to explain something to the Asgardian. Bucky was 96.87% sure that Thor had snuck a flask of liquor into the place that would make the bathtub gin that he’d managed to sample at the local speakeasy when he was sixteen look like water, and would probably kill you even faster.

Periodically, one group would wander over to see what the others were up to, or to try dragging Steve and Bucky onto the dance floor. Steve had never been a dancer back in the day, but apparently he wasn’t above taking his turn with the girls now. Bucky had ended up clenching his jaw in frustration (and a little jealousy if he was being honest) because what kids called dancing these days seemed to be little more than dry humping to a beat, and although he’d been the one to pull out the take-it-slow card on things between him and Steve, he was still human. And a human who would very much like to be out there and dancing like that with Steve now that he didn’t have to keep an ear open listening for the worsening of Steve’s ever-present wheeze or watch Steve’s heart recoil under his ribs after every irregular beat.

Not that they’d danced back then, in public or private, but there had been other times, other activities. Childish curiosity at first. Then later, just for stress relief, usually in the middle of the night when one or both of them had been lying in the dark, frustrated by a bout of insomnia. Or because honestly, Bucky sometimes worried that Steve wouldn’t survive yet another winter to try his luck with any more of the dames that he brought along for their double dates.

Oh, Bucky knew... he knew that he was in love with his Stevie, had been since before he realised what that really meant, and he was pretty sure that Steve had been just as in love with him. But it just wasn’t done back in their day. It was only Bucky’s reputation as a ladies’ man that managed to diffuse most of the slurs about their sexualities. And maybe a few fist fights as well. It helped that Bucky and Steve both actually _did_ like women as much as the next straight guy. But oftentimes, recounting those dates to Steve, as Bucky lay on his front while trying not to grind himself into the mattress, with the smaller man lying close enough for Bucky to feel Steve’s breath grazing across his cheek, their twin beds pushed together to conserve body heat once the temperature dropped, had led to more than words being swapped between them.

After the fall, Bucky hadn’t been touched in kindness, let alone with anything akin to consensual pleasure, in such a long time by another person that, when he finally made it back to the Tower to live with the reunited Avengers, sometimes the most innocent of physical contact between him and Steve would lead to exaggerated responses. Embarrassingly, more than a few times he’d found himself making excuses and disappearing to his room to deal with an insistent and painfully hard erection that had appeared out of nowhere. He hadn’t even been this bad when he was thirteen years old and could get off in thirty seconds in any remotely private spot, praying to God that the rumours about going blind weren’t true. The first time it had happened after his deprogramming, it had only taken seconds before he was coming so hard he greyed out for a moment, leaving a mess on his navy blue henley as he sagged back against the door to his bedroom. He hadn’t even made it past the threshold.

Bucky flushed at the memory, glad at least that he’d been aware enough to engage FRIDAY’s privacy mode before he’d reached for the waistband of his sweatpants. The last thing he needed was Stark watching him go off like a bottle rocket because Steve had slung an arm around his shoulders. Thankfully, time seemed to be improving his overreaction to careless contact, but he was fairly sure that getting up to dance carried an almost certain likelihood of him coming in his pants like a kid. He shook his head, and glanced through the hair now hanging in his face towards Steve. Thankfully, he appeared to be involved in watching whatever was happening at the Odinson-Foster-Lewis table.

Unlike Steve, Bucky could get a buzz from alcohol, if he drank enough of it, albeit he never got completely blitzed. He could already feel the warm glow starting to settle into his blood from the whiskey and beer, as they’d been here for a good few hours - it must be more than four now, he calculated looking at his wristwatch - and he lifted the beer bottle to drain the last few mouthfuls, his Adam’s apple bobbing as his throat worked.

“Your round,” Bucky told Steve, raising his voice to be heard over the music that seemed to be getting gradually louder as the night progressed. Steve lifted an eyebrow, but tipped his head back to finish his own bottle, before pushing it towards the pile of empties.

“Alright. I’ll be back soon. Gotta take a leak first,” Steve answered, standing and clapping Bucky on the shoulder as he stepped behind him. He hadn’t noticed the way Bucky’s smile had frozen at his words, and continued to the bar to get more drinks, via the restroom.

Bucky closed his eyes and groaned quietly to himself once Steve was out of earshot, cursing under his breath. He’d first noticed a twinge in his lower abdomen about an hour ago, but had been studiously ignoring it ever since. If there was one thing that he was particularly grateful for after the knock-off super-soldier serum, it was his increased bladder capacity - somewhere close to two litres according to Hydra’s tests, though he hadn’t felt any need to confirm that measurement. Now, though, after at least half a dozen drinks, he was beginning to suspect he probably should have paid more attention.

You see, Bucky had a bit of a problem. He just couldn’t “go” in public. It had never been a issue before he had fallen from that damn train. More than once, while in the field during the war, he’d bellied up to the nearest tree or even -  when he couldn’t move from his sniper’s nest in case he was spotted - twisted his hips, just far enough to one side to piss without soaking the front of his pants, then rolled back into position, ensuring that he could fully concentrate on taking the necessary shot. But Hydra had different rules.

As they controlled what he ate, what he drank, when he slept, what he thought, so they also controlled when he went to the bathroom. And, as with everything else, the punishment for breaking the rules ensured that The Asset very quickly learned not to pee unless he was back at a safe-house or Hydra base, and given permission by one of the team, no matter how desperately full he was. This had caused issues initially. No-one had thought through the logistics of the Asset being sent out alone until the first time a team arrived to collect him nearly twenty-four hours after the mission began and found him, rocking back and forth in agony in the bathroom, fit to burst but completely incapable of emptying his bladder. Eventually, somebody had given him permission, and the solo mission protocols were edited thereafter to ensure that during the briefing, the Asset was given permission to urinate when he was in a recognised safe location.

Which had proven interesting when the Helicarriers were destroyed. After he’d dragged Steve from the Potomac and dumped him on the river bank, he’d known he couldn’t go back. But trying to break the programming to allow him to use the bathroom regularly in his own apartment, once he had made it to Bucharest via various deserted Hydra safe houses, had taken a long time, and many painful days where he spent hours sitting on the toilet until his muscles had finally given in. Gradually, as days went by, and he began to remember more about himself, about the past, about Steve _-not-my-mission-_ Steve, it had gotten easier. But only at home. Public bathrooms still proved to be a problem, even years later.

When Steve had turned up after the UN bombing, and everything had gone to shit, he hadn’t even had a moment to consider the issue of his bladder. By the time he’d broken free of his containment while triggered, and later convinced Steve and Sam that he was no longer a danger, it was nearly dark. When Sam had finally curled up in one corner, leaving the super soldiers on guard, Bucky was visibly uncomfortable. Steve had noticed and brought it up, asking if he was injured, and he’d replied without thinking, that he needed to take a piss and sleep. Steve had raised his eyebrows and promptly replied “Well, go take a piss then and find somewhere to bed down. I’ve got this watch,”

Bucky had immediately felt the tightness of his pelvic muscles easing up, and had needed to use every fibre of self control not to run towards the bathroom down the hall. He still wasn’t sure to this day exactly why the order had worked then; possibly because his mind was still slightly suggestible after hearing the trigger words again after so long. Of course, Steve had technically been his C/O during the war, too, so maybe that had also been a part of it. All Bucky knew was that he’d been able to keep his bladder blissfully empty right up until they rode out to collect their equipment from Peggy’s niece and headed to the airport. And honestly, it hadn’t even been an issue until he’d tried to go again on the Quinjet shortly before they arrived in Siberia and found that he couldn’t. So he did what he always did -  he gritted his teeth and continued with the mission.

By the time the fight was over, with Steve half carrying him out of that hell-hole - once more lacking an arm - and loading him back onto the Quinjet, he knew that he had bigger worries than peeing. Sure enough, when they’d finally landed in Wakanda a good three or four hours later, they’d been greeted by medical teams who had promptly pulled him into the nearby facilities and sedated him. When he next woke, it was to find himself cleaned up, dressed in pristine white hospital garb and with tubes coming from all kinds of places, including one snaking out from his pyjama pants.

By the time he had healed enough and convinced them about his return to cryo, he’d already got comfortable enough with the new location that he’d only had minimum difficulty with peeing once they had extracted most of the tubes from him, and this had been put down to the prior catheterisation by his doctors. Bucky did nothing to disabuse them of that notion, still too mortified to admit the truth, even to Steve.

When he had eventually, along with Steve, made it back to the Avengers Tower with a new arm and his mind safely de-triggered, it had taken him a few days to get really comfortable with the environment, but at least he could lock his bedroom door, head into his en suite, and just wait. If, that first night, he had resorted to standing under the shower, his flesh hand curved around his exquisitely tender belly and his metal hand tugging at his hair, for three hours before he’d finally found some relief under the seemingly endless hot spray of water, that was his secret. If he’d also found himself on his knees with his forehead pressed into the chill of the tiles, blinking back tears at the sheer euphoria of finally, finally releasing after what felt like an eternity of holding, then nobody besides himself had to know that, either.

He’d tried, at one stage during that first week, engineering a conversation that resulted in Steve once more ordering him to go to the bathroom, but to his disappointment (though not surprise) it hadn’t had the desired effect this time. Thankfully, it had only taken an hour that time for the urgency to overwhelm his muscles, and either Steve had learned a bit of patience since _Before_ or - more likely - had been told by Sam not to chase after Bucky when he disappeared into his room for hours in a row. Truth be told, most of the time back then he **was** actually just brooding, but it helped disguise his long bathroom breaks until he felt more at home. He still couldn’t bear to use the bathroom on the communal floors, nor use his own bathroom if someone (that is, Steve) was in his bedroom or nearby. But to be fair, Steve had continued to give Bucky the space he needed, so it rarely became a big issue.

Until tonight, of course.

It wasn’t the first time he’d gone out drinking, of course. But he’d always prepare first, minimising his fluid intake before they went out, and either stick to high proof shots if he was drinking to get a buzz, or nurse a beer if he was just being sociable. It had worked every time, and even though he’d sometimes been pretty full by the time they made it home in the early hours of the morning, he’d not come that close to his limit. Tonight though? Tonight he’d clearly left his brain at home when he came out. He glanced over and counted the bottles. There were four bottles and matching shot glasses on the table, and someone had already come around once to clear the empties away. That meant they had probably already drunk four beers apiece, as well as the shots.

Bucky swore again. Even taking into account his relative dehydration before they came out, he was already well on the way to his maximum capacity, and it was only just past midnight. Experience meant that they’d be stuck here at least another couple of hours before the rest of the guys started to get bored. Steve didn’t like to leave before everyone else, even though every single one of them was more than capable of looking after themselves. Hell, even Darcy. He’d heard the story of her tasing Thor. That one had no fear.

 _ “Trebuie să merg, sunt în probleme atât de mult,”[↓] _ he muttered darkly, not noticing the confused look on Steve’s face as he placed the new drinks in front of Bucky and retook his seat. He’d even bought two rounds to make up for Bucky’s frustration at the crowds.

“You alright there, Buck?” Steve asked, He’d heard what Bucky had said and actually understood it. Since his escape from Hydra, Bucky was as prone to slipping into Romanian as he was Russian, and as nobody else actually spoke Romanian, Steve had taken it upon himself to learn the language during the months that Bucky had been in cryo. It had made Steve feel weirdly closer to him, even as he slept, and Steve was intending to surprise him with it at some point.

Bucky’s head spun around, and he promptly forced a grin onto his face.

“Fine, Stevie. Just peachy. And you brought extra drinks!” He promptly reached for the shot and downed it, following it shortly after by the second. Maybe, Bucky considered, he could nurse one of these beers until the end of the night, and make it home with his dignity intact somehow.

Steve stared at him for a moment, his lips pursed together, before reaching for his own shot and knocking it back. He barely heard Bucky when, in response to his own thought, he whispered under his breath.

_ “Sper că acest lucru, sau sunt într-un mare bucluc,”[↓] _

This time, Steve didn’t comment. Whatever was bothering Bucky, he’d no doubt let him know if it became a real problem.

Bucky shifted in his seat a little and looked out to where the Natasha and Wanda were now deliberately teasing a group of three guys that had crept up behind them and thought they were being sneaky about it. A couple of well timed flailed “dancing” arms from the women, however, soon had them backing off, one with what looked suspiciously like an incipient black eye. Bucky snorted to himself, then shifted back in his seat. Steve had started talking to him at some point, and he tried to force himself to concentrate on the conversation, but instead he kept finding his mind wandering to his current plight. If it wasn’t the growing discomfort in his bladder, it was his worry about making it home in time. And if it wasn’t either of those things, it was concentrating on making sure that he didn’t show any sign of giving away his situation.

But the alcohol was having the same effect on his kidneys as it would anyone unenhanced, and increasing the output of urine over and above the volume that he had consumed. Even taking into account his body’s tendency to conserve water far better than usual because of the serum, he was still in a situation that was probably going to end badly. Bucky glanced at his watch again. It had only been a quarter of an hour since he previously checked, but already the odd twinge had become a constant hum of pressure in his pelvis, and he was finding it much harder to sit relaxed in his seat without shifting. Instead, he pressed his thighs together as hard as he could, which temporarily took the edge off the urge and he turned his attention back to Steve once more, only to find Steve staring at him with a frown.

“You sure you’re alright there, Buck? I know it’s kinda busy in here tonight. We can always head outside for a few minutes if you’re feeling a bit hemmed in...” Steve offered. Bucky shook his head.

 _ “Nu, nu sunt, sunt doar disperat!”[↓] _ he said _sotto voce_ , before giving Steve a wry grin. “I’ll be fine, pal. I’m just goin’ to...”

Bucky gestured vaguely over Steve’s shoulder in the direction of the restrooms and stood up, trudging through the crowd. Steve twisted in his seat and stared at his retreating friend in confusion, before shrugging and turning back to his beer.

Bucky, on the other hand, wondered why he had even bothered to get up. He already knew this wasn’t going to work, and would just make him feel worse, if anything, but at least he hadn’t had to try to sit still and pretend his bladder wasn’t filling at a rather disturbing speed. He finally reached the signs for the bathrooms and pushed open the external door to the men's’ room, letting it swing shut behind him. Although the urinals weren’t visible from the door, he winced, and headed directly for a cubicle, locking the door behind himself. He wasn’t really up for the social awkwardness of potentially standing next to another guy and not being able to piss. That was uncomfortable enough for anyone, let alone Bucky. He knew he was alone - the only other cubicle was unlocked, with the door wide open - so he lowered the zip of his faded black jeans and with a quick movement freed himself from his boxer briefs, then waited.

And waited.

His bladder cramped, being so close, visibly close, to a toilet and yet not using it, and he winced, huffing out a breath while gently rubbing beneath his navel with his metal hand.

Still nothing.

Bucky tipped his head back and swore quietly to himself, before bearing down with his abdominal and pelvic muscles. His urge to pee shot up dramatically, and he had to resist the urge to double over as still his bladder remained stubbornly full. He let his breath out in a sharp burst through his nose, frustrated and beginning to feel his heart pound as his anxiety grew. In his desire to force his bladder into compliance, he squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, dreading what he was about to do, and pressed the flat of his hand over his lower belly, a motion that made him gasp and bend forward at the waist at the waves of pain and urgency that instantly spread out from under the unforgiving metal of his palm. Even when he pushed as hard as he could with his muscles, while digging his hand as firmly into his bladder as he could stand, the one muscle he needed to just relax refused. He felt a prickle of tears in his eyes from his self-induced torture, and dropped his left hand so that it hung limply at his side. Blinking hard, his head tilted backwards, he sucked in a tremulous breath, followed by another, until he was finally able to pull himself together. Sighing unhappily, he tucked himself away, zipped up and left the cubicle to wash his hands.

The sound of the water running into the sink made his bladder pulse, and he shifted on the spot. As badly as he wanted to turn back into the cubicle again, he knew that it wouldn’t make any difference. Turning taps on had been the first entry on the list of things he had discovered (or perhaps re-learned was a more accurate term) made him want to pee even worse. But, like everything else, it did nothing to actually help him relax when he needed to most. With a flick of his wrist, he turned off the water, and gazed longingly at the reflection of unoccupied toilet behind him in the mirror. It was only when the bathroom door swung open and someone staggered in towards the row of urinals that Bucky pulled a couple of paper towels from the rack, rapidly drying his hands and headed back out towards the table and Steve. As he got into visual range, he groaned to himself. Natalia and Wanda had perched themselves either side of Steve, and all three of them were laughing at something that Wanda had said.

 _You can do this, Barnes,_ he thought, psyching himself up and plastering a generic brooding look onto his face. But the last thing he needed right now was the presence of a telepath and the most perceptive person he’d ever met while he was trying to pretend he wasn’t about to burst.

Bucky threw himself down into his seat, biting back a scowl as the landing jolted through his aching abdomen; reaching for the beer that he had no intention of drinking, he forced himself to pay attention to the conversation around him. Keeping his spine ramrod straight, he clenched his pelvic muscles hard, the urge to shift hitting him every few seconds. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Natalia stare at him intently after a moment, and he forced himself to ignore her. Her eyes narrowed a fraction, before she turned back to laugh at Wanda’s tale, and Bucky twisted in his seat under the pretext of facing the group more directly, grinding himself hard into the wooden seat. The relief was sweet, but within seconds, the demands from his brain to move were already building again.

A sudden spasm in his bladder had him biting his bottom lip, his hips tilting forwards. In a flash, he reached down to scratch at the back of his calf, hoping that his quick thinking had covered his involuntary response, only sitting up again when the pressure finally began to ease off a fraction. Absently, he drummed his metal fingers against his thigh, the muscle rock solid beneath them as he fought his natural reaction to bounce his knee, to twist and squirm, and generally make his predicament obvious to anyone who cared enough to look in his direction. This was the worst part of the whole situation. Bucky knew that it would make no difference. While all these behaviours served to help a _normal_ person to hold on, to wait until they reached a bathroom, for him it merely served to inform everyone around him that his bladder was full to overflowing but he still couldn’t go, even when he was standing right there, staring at his salvation. But no matter how often he had been in this scenario over the years, he had never been able to train himself not to react as if staying dry depended upon every last wriggle.

When the next contraction hit, his pelvic muscles burning furiously under the pressure, he skidded his chair back, shooting to his feet and slamming the forgotten bottle hard enough to the table that everyone turned to stare up at him. Steve’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, his mouth opening to speak, but Bucky spoke first.

“I hafta get some air,” he choked out, forcing a smile that was more pained grimace.

Steve frowned, began to offer to come with him, but Bucky waved him off irritably.

“Jesus, Steve, I’m not a fucking child, just...” he muttered, the struggle to stand normally in front of his friends pushing his patience to the edge. He drew in a huge breath through his nose and held it a beat before he continued. “Sorry, sorry. Just... I need a few minutes. All this...”

Bucky gestured vaguely around the busy bar, hoping that the group would just accept this. Steve’s lips thinned, but he nodded. Bucky sighed inwardly in relief, almost silently adding, as he turned away, “... _ şi trebuie să pișat atât de grav!”[↓] _

Steve’s eyes widened as he watched his best friend and partner stalk towards the door, the crowd parting before him, like the Red Sea before Moses, as he was, no doubt, glowering and radiating danger. His mind ran over the last few moments of the conversation again, but the conclusion was clear. Bucky needed to go to the bathroom - in the worst way, going by his behaviour - but what Steve couldn’t grasp was why he hadn’t simply gone when he’d been to the restroom maybe twenty minutes ago. Before he could continue to puzzle over it, however, the sensation of a warm, small hand on his forearm drew his attention and he lifted his head to meet Natasha’s speculative gaze.

“So, Barnes, then...” she began neutrally. Steve simply shrugged. He knew that Natasha would be digging into Bucky’s odd behaviour until she worked out the truth, and honestly, this was one time that he really didn’t want to help her work it out. He only hoped that she truly wasn’t capable of speaking Romanian - or had missed his quiet admission, at the least.

“Like he said, all this,” Steve gestured at the crowd, the huge speakers pumping out the heavy bass of the music, before draining the last of his beer, and pushing the two untouched bottles towards the perplexed women. “Here, you two may as well enjoy these. I don’t think Buck’s really in the frame of mind for much more tonight,”

Thankfully, Wanda nodded, a sympathetic frown on her face, and managed to drag Natasha over towards Thor’s raucous laughter across the room, giving Steve a moment to run over the evening again before he stood and shrugged into his leather jacket. Bucky’s coat was still draped across the back of his chair; he reached for it, and headed towards the exit.

 

~ X ~

 

As Bucky strode away from the table, he didn’t dare stop or look back. Every step he took jarred through his swollen bladder like a knife and he felt his pulse starting to pound as adrenaline flooded through his veins. He was pretty near his limit right now, and the fear was starting to feel suffocating. Had he been in this situation at home, by now he would have been under the shower, waiting until his muscles finally gave way to blissful relief; but he wasn’t at home. He was in a crowded bar in the middle of Lower Manhattan, and he honestly wasn’t sure any more if being in public would be enough of a psychological trigger to keep his dignity intact... and even if it was, whether he’d be able to get back to his room without losing control along the way once he reached the Tower.

He reached forwards, shoving the door open without even slowing, and the cool evening air caused a shudder of intense need to shake his whole frame. His eyes quickly flicked around, finally settling on a narrow alleyway between two buildings half a block away, and he took off as fast as he could without running. The impact of breaking into a jog would be almost more than he could bear right now. Turning off the main sidewalk, he hurried past the dumpster that belonged to the restaurant on one side of the darkened corridor and scouted around for signs of life. No homeless people trying to keep warm. Nobody visible from the sidewalk. No windows overlooking his hiding spot.

Only when Bucky was sure that he was alone, only then did he give into the urging of his body, both hands flying between his thighs in an instant, his legs winding together as he bent double at the waist with an almost silent groan. Without conscious thought, his left hand crept back along the inner seam at the crotch of his jeans, his fingers digging almost cruelly into his body behind his balls where he could feel his pelvic muscles trembling under the strain of holding back the intense pressure within his abdomen. It wasn’t until he felt himself starting to get hard that he realised that he was rocking his hips back and forth, grinding against his metal wrist while the palm of his flesh hand pressed against his growing erection. He stared down at himself in horror. Arousal was absolutely the last thing on his mind but his body was once more betraying him and behaving in a way that was completely contrary to his mind.

Had he not been quite so frantic, he might have recognised that his system was simply responding to the combined physical stimuli automatically, but with his pulse pounding in his ears and his breath rushing from his lungs in quick, panicky gasps, all he could think about was shame. Shame, humiliation, disgust, horror. The STRIKE team watching in amusement as he writhed in pain, with a whole day’s urine filling his bladder. Being told that he could pee, but then being forced to hold for longer, in silence, without moving, his hands clenched at his sides as he stood in the bathroom and waited to be given permission, well trained and waiting for each command, like the attack dog he was. Men smoking and passing around beer in the garden of the safehouse, taking bets on how long it would take the feared Winter Soldier to piss his combat pants; then later, the same men alcohol soused and howling in laughter as his face burned in mortification, standing in a stinking puddle of his own waste, rapidly cooling material clinging and chafing until his skin itched and burned, before finally having a cold hose turned on him when they couldn’t bear the reek of ammonia emanating from his stained clothes any longer. Being forced to sleep in a long abandoned dog house in those freezing, soaked clothes because he clearly wasn’t housebroken yet.

Bucky wheezed, shaking his head until his ears rang in an attempt to tear himself free from the images flashing through his mind, only realising that at some stage he had dropped to the ground when the sharp throb from where his kneecaps had slammed into the concrete finally penetrated the slideshow of memories fogging reality. Rapidly, he calculated how long it would take him to reach the safety of his rooms. It had to be a good fifty blocks back to the Tower. If he’d been able to run, he could have been back in five minutes. But he had to bite back a whine, his teeth sinking painfully into his bottom lip, at just the idea. He wasn’t entirely sure if he could even walk right now, and - even bearing in mind that he was far faster because of his super-soldier physiology - that would take him at least half an hour, on a good day. Tonight, however, was anything but good.

A sudden, excruciating contraction tore through his lower belly, distracting Bucky from any further thought as his fingers clamped painfully tight around his groin, the heel of his hand pinning his aching, but thankfully no longer hard, dick against his pelvic bone in a frantic effort to ensure he didn’t leak, even though he still wasn’t sure whether his fucked up head or his overtaxed body was going to take priority. He shifted, forcing the hard edge of his boot into his crotch as a wave of heat rushed from the pit of his stomach and down, through his pelvis and along his length to the very tip of his dick and he whined in the back of his throat, shaking his head in denial yet convinced he could feel wetness under his palm. It seemed like an eternity before the urge eased even a fraction, but the moment it did, Bucky lifted his quivering hand into the shaft of light spilling into the darkness from the street, then glanced down at his pants. _Sweat. It’s just sweat,_ he told himself, his throat almost painfully dry as he attempted to swallow in momentary relief.

Before he could even fully release the breath he’d been unconsciously holding, though, a second spasm hit, and he scrambled to his feet, clumsy fingers fumbling at the zip of his jeans in a frenetic rush as he spun on the spot, freeing himself and planting his left hand against the wall hard enough to crack the brick under his palm as another wave of heat poured through him once more until he swore he could feel the first blissful burst of urine about to spill from his body at last...

... Before it faded back into the desperate pulsating misery of his bladder yet again.

Bucky turned his head, sinking his teeth into the flesh of his bicep until he tasted copper on his tongue, even through the cotton of his long sleeved henley, muffling his scream of frustration. He tipped his head forward until the rough brickwork pressed into his forehead and fought back the tears that threatened to seep from beneath his closed eyelids. His breath came in shallow pants as he rocked back and forth on his toes, still exposed and babbling helplessly to himself, praying for it all to _stop, please stop._ His heart thundered under his ribs, his knees feeling weak and nausea lurching in his stomach as the anxiety finally overwhelmed him and his world narrowed to a pinpoint of terror, pain, and the overwhelming need to just let go.

 

~ X ~

 

To his dismay, when Steve eventually managed to slip out from the bar, Bucky appeared to have vanished. He had clearly been in a bad way, and Steve peered along the street in both directions, rubbing the back of his neck as he figured out what to do next. Without any real idea why Bucky hadn’t simply used the bathroom inside, he had no real idea where to begin to search. Perhaps the crowds had simply been too much, Steve reasoned to himself - after all, pretty much every guy had experienced a moment of stage fright at some point when faced with a public urinal. Maybe he’d headed out to find a quieter bathroom. Squinting, he mentally inventoried every business sign visible for three blocks in either direction, but pretty much everything was either shut this late at night, or almost certainly didn’t have a customer bathroom.

Steve huffed in concern, unsure of his next step. He was pretty sure that Bucky wouldn’t have decided to walk home without his jacket with the current nighttime chill; at least, on a normal day, he wouldn’t have done. He briefly considered that Bucky might have decided to sprint back to the Tower, but quickly ruled that out. If Bucky had been as desperate as Steve suspected he must have been, then running was probably the last thing he wanted to do. And the more Steve considered it, the more he winced at how bad Bucky’s situation had to be. They were pretty equally matched physically. Steve had been to the restroom once that evening, and he was already feeling the first effects of the later drinks that they had consumed. While Bucky had always seemed to have a phenomenal bladder capacity since Hydra had added the serum to his system, and Steve had rarely seen him even admit he had to pee since they had been reunited in Bucharest, even Bucky had to have a limit.

With a baffled frown, Steve was reaching into his pocket for a nickel, deciding that a coin-flip was about as valid a reason to choose which direction to search first when he heard what sounded like a stifled, indistinct yell. His head snapped to the right, tracking the noise, and he quickly spotted a narrow gap between a dark, shuttered up Thai restaurant and what appeared to be a vintage clothing boutique, on the opposite side of the street. Without stopping to consider, he darted between the vehicles, ignoring the blare of the horn of an irate taxi driver, and quietly slipped towards the mouth of the alley. Honestly, he wasn’t sure if Bucky was down here, but there were still plenty of folk out who were willing to rob or beat a person in the darkness of the night. Whoever it was, Captain America couldn’t just ignore the situation without at least checking.

Slowly, Steve glanced around the corner of the building, and the sight before him made his chest ache in sympathy. Bucky’s hair was hanging around his face as he leant into the wall, just his head and shoulders visible over the dumpster and seemingly oblivious to the stench of garbage and decaying food that permeated the entire area. Even from the street, with the passing vehicles, Steve’s enhanced hearing could hear him chanting in Romanian, almost begging, as the tips his metal fingers dug into the crumbling masonry beneath them.

 _“Te rog, te rog, fuck, trebuie să merg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg,_ fuck, fuck, _te rog, trebuie să merg...”[↓]_ Bucky whimpered, words smearing together in the panic-stricken litany of his desperation.

In his agitation, Bucky failed even to notice Steve’s careful approach. Only when Steve paused on the other side of the dumpster, and quietly called his name, did Bucky register that he had company, his back stiffening as his shoulders visibly tensed. Despite that, he continued to gasp out the same three phrases, his face still pressed to the wall; his entire body burned in humiliation as he waited for Steve’s judgement, the inevitable disgust, his pulse bounding so loudly in his head that he barely heard Steve say his name a second time.

Instead, Bucky pushed his mouth against the back of his left hand hard enough to bruise the delicate tissues inside his lip as they were crushed on his teeth, trying to silence a moan as yet another spasm twisted inside him, his thighs trembling as he bore down, needing so badly to just go, just empty himself, even with the man he loved more than anything standing just a few feet from him in a filthy alleyway. Instead of relief, though, a sharp stab rippled through him, referring up under his ribs, leaving him winded, and spread down, until he felt like he’d been kicked in the balls, his abdominal muscles rigid over the unbearable stretch inside his body. Bucky hissed, his head flying backwards away from the wall, his eyes glittering bluer than ever from unshed tears and the muscle in his jaw ticcing as he ground his teeth against the howl that hovered on the tip of his tongue.

“Steve!” Bucky groaned after a moment, distraught and still caught up in the Romanian that always seemed to spill from his lips in these moments, but finally acknowledging his friend’s presence. “Steve, _te rog..._ please, _trebuie să merg_... _!”[↓]_

Steve responded in the only way that he could think of.

 _“Știu,_ Bucky. _Merge,”[↓]_ he told him. Bucky’s head turned, finally meeting Steve’s gaze, his eyes wide and his red, bitten lips parting in surprise. Strands of sweat damp hair clung to his face. Steve smiled gently, trying to calm the frantic and agitated man before him; slowly Steve stepped towards him until he could finally settle his large palm in the centre of Bucky’s back, feeling him tremble under the contact, but the familiar touch at last grounded him. Bucky dropped his head, and when he next spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.

“I can’t,” he said, his words shaky, “I hafta go, Steve, I hafta go so bad and I can’t,”

Rather than question him, Steve made a calming noise, rubbing along Bucky’s spine.

“You need to go home.” Steve stated and Bucky nodded, but his breath caught in his throat once more.

“Not sure if I can make it home, either,” he admitted, his cheeks burning and his eyes boring into the concrete beneath his boots, mortified by his own words.

As if on cue, another wave of desperation had Bucky bent double, hands shoved back between his thighs, his legs knotted together as he writhed on the spot. Even with his back still towards Steve, Bucky squeezed his eyes shut. Knowing that Steve was there, watching him gradually lose control like a defiant toddler who had refused to follow his mother’s instruction to pee before going to the market - and, oh boy, **that** was a memory that Bucky hadn’t thought about in nearly a century - was slowly killing him inside. Steve cringed in sympathy, silently waiting for the worst to pass and for Bucky to straighten up, then held out his jacket.

“Let’s get you home, Buck. Get your jacket on and I’ll be back with the bike in a couple of minutes,” Steve said, squeezing Bucky’s shoulder, but Bucky was immediately shaking his head no, frigid metal fingers wrapping around Steve’s wrist to prevent him from leaving.

“No, I can’t... Steve, I can’t... What... what if....  Steve, _ te rog [↓] _... please...” Bucky brokenly tried to explain through his panic.

Steve hadn’t thought that Bucky could have blushed any more, but somehow his face flushed even darker. It took him a moment to work out what was bothering Bucky, but once the lightbulb turned on inside his head, Steve reached both hands to cup Bucky’s face and ducked his head until Bucky had to meet his eyes.

“Buck, I love you, you jerk. Nothing is going to scare me away, not even a bit of pee,” he told him gently. “All I give a damn about right now is that you’re in pain, and the only way to fix this is to get you home,”

Bucky swallowed, a lump settling in his throat and he tipped his head back, furiously blinking away the tears that were threatening to fall. Steve leaned forward, brushing his lips across Bucky’s in a barely there touch, before he stepped back.

“I’ll be as fast as I can,” Steve promised, before turning on his heel.

He covered the four blocks at a sprint to the spot where he’d left his Harley parked, sliding his bike helmet on while simultaneously slinging his leg across the leather saddle and hitting the starter button in a smooth motion. Pulling out into the traffic, he wove between the vehicles and, sure enough, just a minute later, he pulled across the mouth of the alley where Bucky, his pants fastened and his jacket zipped up against the night chill, was pacing back and forth, terrified of what would happen if he stopped moving even for a minute. Without a word, he passed the spare helmet to Bucky, and tilted his head towards the pillion spot.

Bucky swallowed visibly, clenching his pelvic muscles as hard as he could before sliding behind Steve. Even that fraction of a second without his thighs pressed together was almost intolerable and without realising it, he caught himself shifting his pelvis forwards against the bike to compensate. Unable to reach behind himself for the hand grip at his current angle, Bucky found himself having to wrap his arms around Steve’s waist. The vibrations of the engine beneath his backside dragged a whine from Bucky’s throat and Steve turned to glance over his shoulder. Bucky just lifted a hand to gesture for Steve to get going. Every second was weakening his will and as Steve pulled into the flow of traffic, the throttle opening and the engine roaring to life beneath them, he found himself dropping his right hand from Steve’s narrow waist and shoving his fist against his crotch. Every bump, every pothole on the road slammed through his belly until Bucky was gritting his teeth hard enough that he began to fear that he would chip them.

Steve was doing everything in his power to weave through the queues of traffic as fast as possible, but every time a traffic signal or stop sign caused a delay, he couldn’t help glancing over to Bucky. With the visor flipped up, he couldn’t miss the pinched look of pain in Bucky’s eyes, and every time he squirmed against the muscle fluttering in the effort to keep the flood contained, he slid into Steve’s back, his hips bracketing Steve’s.

Bucky stared across at the street signs, mentally counting the distance left to travel and cursed under his breath. Even on a bike, working through New York City traffic was like attempting to walk through molasses. The light that they were currently sitting at seemed to have been stuck on red for the last five minutes. His grip tightened almost painfully around Steve as a particularly harsh cramp rippled through his overfilled bladder, and - to his horror, Bucky was certain he felt a tiny, but definite, trickle spill into the cotton of his boxers. It wasn’t even close to enough to make a difference to his comfort, nor to visibly dampen his pants, but **Bucky** knew. Without even turning, Steve felt Bucky stiffen behind him, quietly whining in the back of his throat, and he frowned in sympathy. He didn’t dare consider the long term effects if Bucky didn’t manage to make it home at least visibly dry... but the’d barely travelled a third of the distance and already Bucky was losing the last few remnants of control within his grasp, minute by minute.

After what seemed like an aeon, the lights finally turned in their favour and Steve accelerated hard. The sudden jolt to his belly was all it took for a another burst of urine to finally force its way past the obstruction of his pelvic muscles, longer than the last leak and even over the roar of the bike, the rush of the wind, Steve could still hear Bucky gasp harshly.

“No, no no, _ nu acum!” [↓] _ he whimpered, grinding his hips blindly against the hard seat of the bike and, inadvertently, up against Steve. Had it been any other situation and Steve would have found himself distracted enough to pull over and drag Bucky into the nearest semi-private corner to demonstrate the effect that his wriggling was having, but today, all that Steve could think about was to get him back to privacy as fast as possible to end his pain and save whatever dignity he still had. By the time Bucky managed to clamp down and stop the flow, the knuckles of his flesh hand were unmistakably slick, his hand barely covering the patch just to the side of his zip, that had, by now, soaked through his underwear and the heavy denim of his pants. Shame prickled across Bucky’s skin, blooming from the pit of his stomach to the roots of his hair and he clenched his eyes shut, begging his almost exhausted body to hang on, to wait, just _wait_ a little longer.

A sudden swerve around an idling car startled Bucky, his eyes flying open and his stomach dropping into his boots as he felt himself slipping from the bike; without any thought, he promptly grabbed onto Steve’s waist with both arms, hauling himself back into place and pressing his chest flush against Steve’s back. He counted each block as the signs whipped past, they were just half a dozen blocks from home, from relief.

Finally, with the Tower visible up ahead, Bucky began to hope that he would make it back just in time.  Steve barely slowed as he turned into the entrance to the  parking garage, and the back tyre bounced into a pothole in the tarmac, jolting Bucky hard. He grunted, in extraordinary pain, desperate to cradle his aching abdomen and simultaneously, as his bladder cramped down, a gush of pee escaped, quickly soaking his crotch, coursing over his balls in a fierce, hot rush. Although he managed to wrest back control after just a couple of seconds, he knew that there was no way to hide his condition, and the small release had simply ramped his urgency up beyond anything else that he’d experienced tonight.

“Shitshitshit...” Bucky spat, his voice pitched anxiously high, caught between exasperation and mortification, and not even trying to silence himself.

Steve bit his lip when, a few moments later, the scalding wetness of Bucky’s last leak finally soaked through the back of his own jeans, but he made no move to acknowledge the realisation. Steve knew that Bucky only had to hold on a couple more minutes as they pulled into the residents’ parking area in the basement of the Tower. As soon as he cut the engine and kicked up the stand, Steve was beside Bucky and grasping his left arm, urging him off, but Bucky resisted,

“Steve, I don’ think I can,” he rasped, his accent thickening with his swirling emotions and his eyes wide as he bent forwards, both hands pressing into his crotch. Droplets of rapidly cooling urine glistened, forced from the soaked fabric and trickling across his curled fingers as he forced his fists to support his twitching muscles. “If I try an’ move, I don’ know that I’ll  be able to stop it,”

Bucky’ gazed up at Steve, who had pulled off his helmet and looped it over his hand, Bucky’s eyes, his whole posture, begging his friend for an answer and Steve frantically scanned the half empty parking structure for inspiration while Bucky rocked back and forth, sucking shallow breaths through his nose in an attempt to reduce the pressure in his abdomen from simply drawing air into his lungs.  
  
“FRIDAY,” Steve spoke, even as his fingers set to work unfastening Bucky’s helmet; he knew that the AI also monitored this level of the tower for security purposes, deciding that the least he could do was try to provide Bucky with a bit of privacy. “Please disable current monitoring of myself and Sergeant Barnes until I say otherwise.”

“Would you like me to permanently delete any footage from public areas that contains yourself and Sergeant Barnes during this time-frame?” FRIDAY asked. Steve confirmed the process, hooking the second helmet from the handlebars once it was free, and as soon as FRIDAY had stopped actively monitoring them, Steve stepped into Bucky, sliding a hand into the back of Bucky’s hair.

“Come on, Buck, It’s just you and me,” Steve reassured him. “We have to give it a try,”

Bucky bit his lip, and nodded. Squeezing his thighs as tightly to the side fairing as he dared and twisting his hips as hard as he could into the bike, he rapidly slid one hand to the empty seat in front of him to lever himself off, grimacing as his eyes tracked a drop of wetness along the seam of the leather. Within a second of moving his hand away from his crotch, though, he groaned, another tiny trickle leaching between his fingers, and he slid from the bike gracelessly as Steve pulled on his metal bicep. As soon as his feet hit the floor, he was doubled up, his hands buried between his thighs as he writhed on the spot, his knees bending as he bounced on the balls of his feet.

“Jesus, Buck,” Steve said, his own voice taut with concern. “Just... just go here already, I’ll keep watch,”

Bucky blinked hard, a bead of perspiration trailing down the nape of his neck and into his collar, drawing out a shudder as it ran coolly down his overheated skin. He made a noise of agreement in the back of his throat, letting Steve guide him, painfully slowly, towards the partly shadowed corner of the garage and, although it was only a few yards, it seemed to take forever. When he was finally surrounded on two sides by walls, with Steve standing at his back as look out, he quickly yanked the zip of his jeans down and shifted, hoping that he wouldn’t leak even more before he had freed himself from his clothes. The chilled air against sensitive, damp skin sent a shiver down his spine, and his bladder contracted painfully hard automatically. Instantaneously, he dropped his other hand, shifting his feet apart and unclenched his exhausted pelvic muscles. A wave of pressure spread through him, his breath stuttering as finally, finally a slow stream of urine began to seep from him, his head falling backwards as he panted in delicious anticipation.

Steve heard the spatter of a few drops of liquid hitting concrete, but before he could let the breath from his lungs in a relieved sigh, Bucky let out an agonised howl, almost instantaneously subdued, and Steve spun around. A quick glance down to the floor showed that apart from a few penny-sized dark spots, Bucky was no better off than before, and Steve hissed as he realised that Bucky’s jaws had locked around his own flesh arm, yet again, to muffle his voice. Only now, under the lighting, was he able to see the small, bloodied holes puncturing Bucky’s sleeve from earlier.

“Bucky, no, no!” he cried, softly, “Come on, stop now.” He slid his hand between Bucky’s chin and chest, and steadily pried his teeth from his antebrachium. Bucky let go with a sudden keening gasp, straightening his clothes and twisting himself back into a knot.

“Can’t... Still can’t go,” Bucky groaned, gritting his teeth. “Hafta get back to the apartment, Steve, right now,”

“Alright, Buck, let’s go,” Steve replied, calmly taking charge and guiding them both towards the door to the lobby, his palm settled firmly above the rear waistband of Bucky’s jeans. Steve gave him a quick once-over, satisfied that his pants didn’t appear obviously wet at this point unless you looked closely, although nobody looking at Bucky’s posture or stance would be under any illusion of his current crisis. Once they reached the glowing exit sign, he held his hand up, gesturing for Bucky to wait while he checked the lobby, and pulled the door open.

One step inside, and Bucky was hissing his name in a stage whisper. When Steve turned his head, eyebrows drawn together in a question, Bucky’s mouth was open, eyes wide in horror, his voice hoarse when he spoke.

“Shit, Steve, I’m sorry... your jeans... at the back...” Bucky said, dismayed, cheeks blotched furiously scarlet.

Steve had almost forgotten, but now that Bucky had pointed it out, he felt the damp coolness against the small of his back and the top half of the seat of his jeans. Unlike Bucky’s pants, however, his were medium blue, and the wet area would be blatantly obvious.

“It’s alright, pal,” Steve tried to reassure him, depositing the bike helmet on the carpeted floor just inside the lobby, and efficiently stripping his jacket off, followed by his sweater, which he quickly knotted around his midsection. He dropped the leather garment next to the helmet, adding “Told ya it’d take more than that,”

With a small smile, Steve quickly stepped further into the lobby while Bucky peered around worriedly, his lip rolled between his teeth while he squirmed helplessly, his leg endlessly jiggling. Steve was back in maybe a minute, pulling open the door and hurriedly gesturing for Bucky to come inside.

“Nobody here, let’s go.” he explained, hooking up his coat and helmet under one arm as Bucky started towards him.

“What about the receptionist?” Bucky asked, confused, and had he not been so distracted by his own struggle, he probably would have laughed at the mischievous expression on Steve’s face. Oh, he’d seen that look before over the years, so many times; everyone was so sure that Cap was Mr-Innocent-Patriot but Bucky knew full well that Steve Rogers was the worst little shit when it came to being a sneaky bastard. Bucky had been blamed so often for dragging sweet little Stevie into some kind of scheme, even though most of the time, Steve had been the instigator.

“I _may_ have told her that Tony sent me to find some paperwork and persuaded her to go into the office to find me a copy of the ID-Ten-T form for EMHO logs,” Steve admitted, his eyes twinkling in amusement as he turned, walking backwards ahead of Bucky and hitting the call button for the elevator as he waited for Bucky to catch up,

Bucky snorted, knowing that Steve had been caught out himself by some of the Navy guys during the war by almost the very same fool’s errand, then flinched, doubling over for a moment as his bladder cramped in response and moaning quietly as he jammed his wrists harder against his crotch.

“Jesus fuck, Stevie!” he gasped, chewing the corner of his mouth until he could straighten up and step inside the open elevator car. “Make me laugh again an’ so help me, I’ll tan your ass into leather,”

“Sorry, Buck,” Steve grimaced, genuinely remorseful, as he dashed in after him and repeatedly hit the door close button. When the doors finally slid together, he addressed the AI. “Our floor, please,  FRIDAY, as quick as you can... and preferably without any stops, if you could.”

“Certainly, Captain,” FRIDAY replied, and began carrying them the eighty odd floors to their apartment.

Bucky grunted in pain at the initial bounce of the elevator as it started to climb, even though it was barely noticeable at any other time. He wound his legs together as tightly as he could, twisting almost obscenely against his hands and Steve found himself torn between averting his eyes to allow him some privacy and watching transfixed. There was something horribly compelling about the way Bucky moved, a bit like an oncoming car wreck that you couldn’t look away from and although it horrified him to realise it, Steve found his gaze repeatedly drawn back to his best friend, even while his chest tightened in sympathetic anxiety for him.

Bucky’s eyes flicked to the floor numbers, his face crumpling for a second at their progress, and he twisted his head to wipe the flop sweat from his forehead against his shoulder. After another second he began pacing back and forth, his whole belly aflame with the crushing pressure inside him, referring in waves around his sides and into his back, high underneath the bottom edge of his ribs, agitatedly trying to find a position to deal with these last few minutes. He barely noticed the copper taste of blood on his tongue as his teeth sank into his lower lip, the pain not even registering over that in pelvis, his bladder sitting like a white hot coal in the cradle of his hip bones.

Another cramping spasm, and Bucky dropped down onto his haunches with an anguished growl, thrusting his crotch hard against the heel of his boot as he balanced on his toes, his thighs squeezed painfully tightly together around his hands, physically pinning his body closed with every method he could think of. At a loss, Steve dropped his hand to Bucky’s shoulder and gently squeezed, trying to convey all of his love and concern in that one simple touch. Perhaps it worked, as Bucky let his head fall forwards, resting his forehead against the handrail of the elevator car, even as he ground against the hard pressure from his boot, his hands reinforcing his achingly exhausted muscles as they travelled ever closer to their floor.

As good as her word, FRIDAY ensured that when the elevator finally came to a stop, it was at their private floor, the doors opening onto the main hallway, with the door to Steve’s room to the right and Bucky’s to the left, maybe ten yards from the elevator. Bucky lifted his head and staggered to his feet, unable to stand completely upright and started to limp towards the door ahead of him. He was so close, so very close, but every step reverberated through him like a bullet tearing through delicate sinew and muscle. The effort of just placing one foot in front of the other was, by now, causing a fine tremor to shake through his legs, and he knew if he stopped even for a moment, he wouldn’t be able to move again.

“Steve,” he gulped, “Get the door,”

Steve dashed ahead, turning the handle and swinging the door inwards before stepping back to give Bucky space to continue into his bedroom. He followed, hitting the light switch and hurried around Bucky againt to push open the door to the bathroom. Bucky whined, his bladder clenching hard as the bathroom light gave him a clear view of the toilet and even as he crossed the threshold into his bathroom, Steve was moving back and making to leave. Bucky immediately pulled his hands free from his groin, certain that Steve’s proximity to him would give him the precious few seconds that he needed to open his jeans; instead, to his horror, even as his fingers frenziedly scrabbled at his zip, he felt his bladder give one final, wrenching paroxysm, his muscles giving way to a sudden deluge.

With something akin to a choked sob, Bucky began to shake his head furiously in denial.

“Oh, no, Nononono, shit, _ nu, dumnezeu, câcat, pulă mea, sugi pulă!” [↓] _ he swore savagely, as white hot urine gushed from him uncontrollably, instantly drenching the placket of his jeans before spreading in a rapid torrent along the inside of his right leg, the thick material glistening almost immediately. With a quiet whimper, his left hand shot out to grab the edge to the vanity around the sink, his knees suddenly weak as the scalding rivulets surged further over his skin, running over his boot and puddling around him on the tiled floor. Just seconds later, streaks began to appear along the left leg, and an ever increasing number of drips started to fall from the saturated cotton at the apex of his thighs, tumbling into the spreading pool of piss around Bucky’s feet.

Steve stared aghast as the scene played out in front of him, his heart aching for Bucky. For a moment he stood frozen, watching as Bucky’s head dropped back between his shoulder blades with a groan, the rush of endorphins and glorious relief as his bladder finally released flooding his synapses with pleasure, even as his entire body prickled with humiliation, but right now - for just a few seconds - the blissful sensation overwhelmed him. But all too soon, the reality of his current situation slammed into Bucky like a physical blow and he squeezed his eyes shut against his shame, curling in on himself, determined not to compound matters by letting Steve see him crying as well. Disgust built in his stomach until he felt almost nauseated, and unbidden, words tumbled from his lips.

 _ “Te grețos, fără rost, risipă de spațiu!” [↓] _ he spat, words slipping rapidly between his clenched teeth. _ “Ești o terfelit, împuţit, fără valoare bucată de piele!” [↓] _

Steve snapped out of his stupor and stepped forwards, mindless of the still-expanding puddle around Bucky’s boots and slid his arm around his friend’s hunched shoulders.

“Don’t, Buck... please don’t. You’re not sickening, you’re not worthless or soiled. You aren’t any of those things,” he insisted, resting his forehead against Bucky’s temple and brushing his lips against his damp hair.

Bucky blinked repeatedly against the sting behind his eyelids as his bladder continued to spill, with no immediate sign of stopping, but Steve simply stood beside him, holding him until finally, finally the stream started to slow, eventually becoming a trickle and petering out, even as his bladder continued to cramp down painfully, his body desperate to ensure that he was completely drained. Only then, with his jeans still dripping to the wet floor beneath him and the drenched fabric quickly cooling around his legs and crotch, did he let himself sink against Steve in exhaustion. His knees had turned to jelly and he felt raw, wrung out, his emotions drained almost as thoroughly as his bladder.

Glancing down at himself, he bit back a half sob. His right leg was completely soaked from the inside seam to the outside, along the full length of his thigh and half of his calf. His left leg was only marginally drier on the outside edge. He was wet half of the way up towards the front of his waistband, where the thinner cotton of his boxer briefs had wicked the fluid higher with each passing second, and he could feel that the back of his jeans, covering his ass, were just as sodden. The puddle of cooling pee around his feet was a good two or three feet in diameter, and as he shifted his weight, his socks squelched unpleasantly inside his boots. With sudden realisation, he pushed away from Steve and tried to move him backwards. Instead, Steve grabbed hold of Bucky’s hands and refused to be pushed away, even as Bucky tried to protest.

“Bucky, stop it!” he eventually told him, his voice firm, and when Bucky spoke, it was barely above a whisper.

“But you’re in my mess...” he replied brokenly, keeping his eyes around the middle of Steve’s chest, too ashamed to meet his gaze. Steve’s heart clenched painfully.

“I don’t care,” Steve enunciated slowly, sliding a hand to cup Bucky’s chin and lift his head, ducking his own until he could stare into Bucky’s face, his thumb brushing across Bucky’s cheek. “Right now, I just want to help you get cleaned up. Anything else we can deal with later. But I am Not. Going. Anywhere.”

Steve pressed his lips to Bucky’s damp forehead, where strands of his soft, dark hair clung to his skin from the long struggle, and reached across to start the water running in the shower beside him. Piece by piece, he helped to strip each item of clothing from Bucky, who stood placidly in place, letting Steve move his limbs as and when he needed to. Steve frowned. A submissive Bucky wasn’t a sight that he’d ever seen before, even on his worst days, and it worried him considerably. However, he masked his concern, and gradually gathered Bucky’s soiled clothes into a pile.

His jacket had managed to escape the dousing, but his henley and tee weren’t quite so fortunate. They were both wet for the bottom few inches, so, carefully rolling the wet fabric over the dry, he peeled both garments off of Bucky’s torso and over his head, managing to keep only the dry parts skimming across his skin. As soon at the air hit his skin, Bucky curled his arms around his midsection, as if trying to cover himself in shame, and Steve paused to stroke his hand over the side of Bucky’s hair, trying to impart some comfort to him. Almost without thought, Bucky found himself leaning into the caress, the fingers brushing lightly across his hair and scalp gently soothing his frayed nerves far more than ever imagined was possible from such a simple touch.

After a long moment, Steve reached for the waistband of Bucky’s jeans, popping the button and tugging down the zip. Having checked the pockets for  belongings, which he carefully stacked on the vanity, he worked to peel away the sticky denim that was now clinging tenaciously to Bucky’s skin, clammy and itchy, until finally they dropped to catch around Bucky’s knees. With one step, Steve leaned over to grab the nearest towel from the rail behind him, and folded the thick, absorbent sheet into four, laying it out in front of Bucky’s feet, and carefully dropping to a crouch to pull off first one of Bucky’s boots and socks, then the other, guiding him to stand on the still dry towel while Steve set to work removing his jeans completely. Lastly, he looped his fingers into the waistband of Bucky’s underwear, stripping them off and dropped them on top of the rest of the wet clothing that he’d piled beside him, before placing his hand onto Bucky’s hip and gently nudging him towards the steam-filled shower.

“You start getting washed up, Buck, I’ll throw these into the washer,” he explained and Bucky ducked behind the frosted glass, grateful for a moment alone. As the water cascaded over his head and shoulders, across the broad expanse of his chest and down the groove of his spine, he placed his hands against the tiled wall, so cold in contrast, and let his head fall forwards until his chin rested against his chest. Only now, under the the powerful spray beating down against him, did he dare let a few silent tears begin to fall as his hair hung in a limp curtain around his face. Steve had been nothing but kind and calm about the entire evening, but despite that, all that his mind could focus on were the images, the insults. Filthy. Disgusting. Repulsive. Unworthy. Subhuman. Useless. Even as his heart pounded in his ears, and his lungs seemed to contract to just a fraction of their normal capacity, he silenced his gasps for breath. He’d already done enough tonight to destroy whatever had been developing between himself and Steve, he didn’t need to make it any worse.

Outside of the stall, Steve efficiently finished cleaning up the bathroom. Thankfully, the towel absorbed the remaining urine from the floor, and, after kicking off his own boots next to Bucky’s, he gathered the armful of laundry and headed towards the utility area of their floor. Once he’d loaded the machine, he glanced at himself and shrugged out of his own jeans and underwear, adding them to the load and starting the wash cycle. Stopping by his room, he stripped off the remainder of his clothes and pulled out a pair of sweatpants and a loose shirt, returning to Bucky’s room and pulling out a similar set of sleepwear for him. Stepping back into the bathroom, he carefully placed the clothes on the side of the vanity, quickly rinsed the worst of the urine from both pairs of boots so that they could be properly washed tomorrow, emptied his own bladder and turned towards the shower. He’d expected Bucky to have reappeared by now, having finished washing up, but instead he realised that Bucky wasn’t even standing and visible through the milky glass.

“Bucky?” Steve called, stepping towards the shower.

When he received no reply, he ducked his head around the door, and bit his lip at the sight of Bucky, curled in the bottom of the stall in a fetal position, his face hidden in his knees as his shoulders heaved in short, rapid breaths while the water pounded down against him. Without speaking, Steve slid in beside Bucky and carefully lowered himself next to him, tugging Bucky’s limp body half into his lap and simply held him, letting his hands drift across Bucky’s back, his neck, his hair and shoulders, making soothing nonsense noises that - on any other day - would have seemed utterly ridiculous. But today, both of them took comfort in their closeness. After a few more minutes, Steve reached for the nearest bottle of shower gel and gently began washing both of them.

Gradually, Bucky’s breathing seemed to slow under Steve’s careful touch. Only when he’d washed every inch of skin, barring Bucky’s most intimate areas, did Steve finally speak.

“You want to finish up here, buddy?” Steve asked softly, and Bucky nodded jerkily, squeezing some of the soapy gel into his hand and curling away from Steve as he finished washing. Steve took the opportunity to get done lathering up himself, and then stood to quickly rinse off. Reaching down, he stretched his hand out, and - when Bucky slowly took it - he hauled the man he loved to his feet, turning off the water and quickly stepping out into the steamy room with Bucky following a moment later. He pulled a towel to himself and tossed the second at Bucky, and Steve vigorously scrubbed himself dry before dressing.

Bucky was only a minute behind him but, before he could pull on his tee, Steve gently pushed him to sit on the closed toilet, and twisted him to examine the self-inflicted bite wounds on Bucky’s skin. The first lot were already healed over, barely pink, and the second set were starting to head towards that stage. Although there was little point, between Bucky’s serum-boosted immune system and the time since they were inflicted, Steve reached into the bathroom cabinet and rummaged around for antiseptic and cotton wool balls. With a dampened piece of cotton in one hand, he carefully wiped every puncture wound that Bucky’s teeth had made in the smooth, golden skin of his arm. Bucky sat quietly, letting Steve take care of him. Normally, he would have either laughed or pushed Steve away in irritation at his fussing. But right now, it filled him with a gentle warmth, a feeling of being loved and cared for that Bucky needed with a craving that was bone deep, though he would die rather than admit that tonight.

Once Steve had completed the routine, he squeezed Bucky’s forearm and passed him his t-shirt. Finally, they both stepped out into Bucky’s bedroom. For a moment they just stared at each other, before Steve spoke.

“Do you want me to stay for a while?” he asked quietly. Bucky paused for a moment, torn, but finally nodded his assent. “Okay, Buck. As long as you want,”

Bucky pulled back the comforter on his bed, glancing at Steve for reassurance, before sliding underneath it and curling onto his side. Steve simply slid in beside him, and hauled Bucky against his chest as if they did this every night. For a moment, Bucky stiffened, before melting into the strong arm wrapped around his back like an anchor. For a few minutes, they simply lay in silence, both enjoying the sensation of being back in each other's’ arms after nearly seventy years. Eventually it was Steve who broke the silence.

“You know, we’re going to have to talk about this at some point, Bucky,” he said quietly. Bucky stiffened, but nodded after few seconds.

“Not now though.” Bucky stated, and Steve squeezed him a little tighter.

“No. Not now,” he agreed. “FRIDAY, could you get the lights please?”

The room plunged into darkness, and Steve dropped a hand to gently soothe beneath Bucky’s belly button, where he knew Bucky must still be aching.

“Go to sleep, Buck,” he said, as he felt Bucky settle himself more comfortably against his side.

“G’Night, punk,” Bucky mumbled. Steve smiled,

“Sleep tight, jerk,” Steve replied.

Hopefully, things would be clearer tomorrow. But whatever they had to face, Steve knew for sure that he would be right beside Bucky; every step of the way.

 

 

 

 

Translations:

[↑] _Trebuie să merg, sunt în probleme atât de mult._ \- I have to go, I'm in so much trouble.

[↑] _Sper că acest lucru, sau sunt într-un mare bucluc._ \- I hope this works, or I'm in a big scrape/mess.

[↑] _Nu, nu sunt, sunt doar disperat!_ \- No, it's not that, I'm just desperate!

[↑] _... şi trebuie să pișat atât de grav!_ \- ... and I have to piss so badly!

[↑] _Te rog, te rog, fuck, trebuie să merg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg, trebuiesămerg, fuck, fuck, te rog, trebuie să merg..._ \- Please, please, fuck, I have to go, Ihavetogo, Ihavetogo, Ihavetogo, Ihavetogo, fuck, fuck, please, I have to go...

[↑] _Steve, te rog... please, trebuie să merg... !_ \- Steve, please... please, I have to go...!

[↑] _Știu, Bucky. Merge._ \- I know, Bucky. Go.

[↑] _te rog_ \- please

[↑] _nu acum!_ \- not now!

[↑] _nu, dumnezeu, câcat, pulă mea, sugi pulă!_ \- no, God, shit, fuck me, suck my dick!

[↑] _Te grețos, fără rost, risipă de spațiu!_ \- You sickening, pointless waste of space!

[↑] _Ești o terfelit, împuţit, fără valoare bucată de piele!_ \- You're a soiled, stinking, worthless piece of skin!

**Author's Note:**

> Science Bits
> 
> **Paruresis** or shy bladder is a **social anxiety disorder**. While many people will experience the odd bout of freezing up/performance anxiety in a public bathroom or providing a urine sample, around 7% of people regularly have problems peeing away from their "safe" bathrooms. At the most minor end of the spectrum, people may have to cover their ears, listen to music on headphones or turn on a tap to allow them to empty their bladder. But at the worst end of the spectrum, it can lead to psychogenic urinary retention - or a complete inability to empty the bladder at all, without the use of a catheter (a tube passed into the bladder via the urethra). 
> 
> It can affect anyone - male or female, any skin colour, age, sexuality etc. There is **no physical condition** underlying it that would cause problems emptying the bladder normally (such as neurological issues, infections, narrowing (stricture) of the urethra, enlarged prostate gland in men, kidney/bladder stones etc) and in most people, **it can be managed** with exposure therapy with the help of a pee buddy, therapy, hypnosis, breathing exercises and other techniques to manage anxiety. However, in severe cases, a urologist may advise the use of **intermittent self catheterisation** \- that is, the patient inserts a catheter to empty their bladder every few hours, allowing them to continue day to day life where previously their fear and difficulties may have left them housebound, unable to work or socialise, in recurrent pain, increased risk of urinary tract infections, etc. 
> 
> While it may not sound serious, it can be **devastating for sufferers** , with many too ashamed to seek help for years. It may lead to them losing their job. For severely affected people, they cannot even use their own bathroom at home if somebody else is in the room next to them, or on the same floor as the bathroom - or even in the same house. 
> 
> In reality, with paruresis, if the person is severely affected they are unlikely to lose control of their bladder in public because the anxiety prevents it. But it can happen, especially under duress (such as vibration or pressure) or when they finally get close to their safe bathroom and their body starts to relax before they manage to reach the toilet (as happened with Bucky). 
> 
> Paruresis (and parcopresis, the equivalent for bowel movements, shy bowel) **is caused when** anxiety - usually of being heard or being judged or ridiculed - causes the voluntary sphincter around the neck of the bladder to stay closed, even when the person wants to relax and empty their bladder. Both the bladder and the rectum have two sphincters each. The first is under involuntary control - it stays closed until a certain pressure is reached in the bladder or rectum, and then it opens automatically. This is why babies will be dry for a period of time and then pee, rather than constantly dribbling urine. But as you develop, you gain control over the voluntary sphincters - these allow you to keep the bladder and bowel closed until you either reach a bathroom or wait too long and the pressure overwhelms your voluntary muscles. 
> 
> In **Bucky's** case, it's somewhat different. While he has a lot of social anxiety around toileting because of the mental torment from Hydra, he also has the complication of having been brainwashed and trained into needing permission to pee away from a "safe" place. He will probably need a lot more work to overcome his problems with this. 
> 
> If you, or someone you know, is affected by this problem, please check out sites such as the [UKPT](http://www.ukpt.org.uk/) or the [IPA](http://paruresis.org/) and encourage them (or yourself) to see your doctor for a check up and diagnosis.
> 
>  **Note:** This is only the first part of what I am intending to be a series, so other issues around the subject will be covered at some stage, and I am happy to take **suggestions from any other sufferers** out there.
> 
> The form that Steve asks the receptionist for is a combination of two **Fool's Errands** \- practical jokes you play on new members of your team who are less savvy about terminology etc. The **ID-Ten-T** form is more obvious when you write it as ID-10-T (or ID10T) and is common to many environments, particularly IT. The **EMHO Log** is mainly a Navy one - with EMHO standing for "Early Morning Hard On". But there are dozens of others around.
> 
> Alcohol causes you to lose 100ml of water for every 10ml of pure alcohol consumed. A US standard drink contains about 14ml of alcohol, so you will lose an extra 140ml of water per drink.
> 
> I decided to use Romanian in this, now that it's canon, because of the time link in his head between Romania and the paruresis. Plus, he didn't realise anyone could understand his desperate comments, giving him a little privacy when anxious.


End file.
